Social Media Users’ Perspectives on the Utility of Content Warnings by Big Tech

The study investigated social media users’ perspectives on content warnings by Big Tech. The study was guided by three specific purposes, three research questions and two hypotheses. The study adopted descriptive survey design. A population of the study was the Nnamdi Azikiwe University community involving staff and students, old and young. A sample of 500 respondents was selected used multi-method sampling techniques. A researcher-made questionnaire titled “Social Media Users’ Perspectives on Utility of Content Warning Survey” (SMUPUC) was used for the study. The SMUPUC was validated by two experienced lecturers in Mass Communication and one in Measurement and Evaluation from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka. A pilot study was conducted to determine the reliability of the instrument. Results were analysed using Cronbach Alpha which yielded a correlation index of 0.82. SMUPUC was administered on respondents using two assistants from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka who were briefed adequately on the exercise. At the end, a total of 467 copies of the questionnaire was returned leaving a mortality rate of 6.6 percent only. The research questions were analyzed with the mean (X) and standard deviation, while the hypotheses were tested with t-test statistic at 0.05 level of significance. The findings showed that social media users agreed with the utility of content warnings by Big Tech; sex and age of users were insignificant in their perspective on this utility. Based on the findings, it was recommended among others, that content warnings should continue to be included as requirement of the Big Tech to guard against unwarranted exposure of users to unwanted contents; and Big Tech should improve on apps to guard against underage exposure to adult contents in the social media.